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Happy National Bean Day! If you have never enjoyed a good fresh pot of homemade beans, you are really missing out. Here are nine yummy ways to utilize the humble yet great BEAN!
When my chili pepper addiction expanded to cooking dishes for myself, I was introduced to real refried beans. To my surprise, I learned that there is no real benefit to soaking your bean.
It is absolutely unnecessary and actually, not wise. There is a myth that soaking the beans removes the gasses. Untrue!
When you soak your beans overnight, the natural sugars begin to ferment, thereby producing more gas. In general, people who have very high fiber content in their diets are not bothered with bean gas. Beans are very high in fiber and when they enter the digestive tract of people who eat very little fiber, they naturally start things moving and the result is GAS! (If this is a problem for you, there are a number of digestive products on the market that work wonderfully.)
You will find a wide variety of recipes that use beans. For most of them you may use canned or start from scratch beans.
To me the advantages of cook from scratch beans are:
- Cost! Particularly if you use a lot of beans. Most types of dry beans cost less than a dollar a pound and remember, you will get nearly double their volume in product once they are cooked.
- Health. There is just so much sodium in canned beans that I try to stay away from them.
- Taste and Texture. I also prefer the texture of scratch beans better than canned.
Using canned or dried beans will greatly depend on what you are using them for. If for example, you simply want to put a few beans in a salad or a burrito, then perhaps opening a can is more efficient and convenient. If you are planning a meal based around beans or a bean dish, it is probably a good idea to cook your beans from scratch.
Just remember the ratio of dry to cooked is they double in volume: ½-cup dry becomes 1-cup cooked. Big tip: do not put any salt in the pot with the beans as they cook because it tends to make them tough. Salt them after the fact. You can, however, add garlic, onion, bay and other herbs and seasonings to the pot.
Don’t be afraid of cooking with beans. They are inexpensive, delicious and so healthy! Happy National Bean Day!
Recipes from this article
Homemade Refried Beans
4
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- 2 cups cooked Pinto Beans (recipe follows)
- 2 tablespoons chili powder
- 1 tablespoon ground cumin
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/8 teaspoon pepper
Instructions
- Heat lard in 10-inch skillet over medium heat until hot. Add Pinto Beans
- cook, stirring occasionally, 5 minutes.
- Mash beans
- stir in chili powder, cumin, salt and pepper. Add more oil to skillet if necessary
- cook and stir until a smooth paste forms, about 5 minutes.
- Garnish with shredded cheese if desired.
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